Free Republic

The discovery of a bizarre species of fossil whale from Australia with huge eyes and flesh-ripping jaws provides valuable new insights into the evolution of whales, researchers say. The previously unknown species lived about 25 million years ago and was an early ancestor of modern baleen whales, which feed by filtering plankton from seawater. This group includes the blue whale, the largest animal ever to inhabit the planet. But the newfound predatory whale likely hunted sharks and other fish despite its relatively small size and suggests that baleen whales weren't always the toothless gentle giants we see in our oceans...

It's a statistic that would have Charles Darwin turning in his grave - more than one third of Americans don't believe in evolution, according to a new study. After tabulating surveys that covered 34 countries, researchers at the University of Michigan have found that U.S. citizens are much less likely to accept Darwinism than Europeans and the Japanese. The study, published in Friday's issue of the journal Science, found that in countries like Iceland, Sweden, Denmark and France, at least 80 per cent of adult believe that humans evolved from other species. In Japan, 78 per cent of adults believe...

Evolution reversed in mice The mouse looks the same but has an ancient gene US researchers have taken a mouse back in time some 500 million years by reversing the process of evolution. By engineering its genetic blueprint, they have rebuilt a gene that was present in primitive animals. The ancient gene later mutated and split, giving rise to a pair of genes that play a key role in brain development in modern mammals. The scientists say the experiments shed light on how evolution works and could lead to new gene therapy techniques. "We are first to reconstruct an ancient...

The question of what happened before the Big Bang long has frustrated cosmologists, both amateur and professional. Though Einstein's theory of general relativity does an excellent job of describing the universe almost back to its beginning, near the Big Bang matter becomes so dense that relativity breaks down, says Penn State physicist Abhay Ashtekar. "Beyond that point, we need to apply quantum tools that were not available to Einstein." Now Ashtekar and two of his post-doctoral researchers, Tomasz Pawlowski and Parmpreet Singh, have done just that. Using a theory called loop quantum gravity, they have developed a mathematical model that...

Darwin won. Moderate Kansas State Board of Education candidates pulled off a victory Tuesday, gathering enough might to topple the board’s 6-4 conservative majority. A victory by incumbent Janet Waugh, a Democrat whose district includes parts of Lawrence, and wins by Republican moderates in two districts previously represented by conservatives left the tables turned heading into the Nov. 7 general election. “If we change the board around, we’ll be able to make decisions that we think are right for our students,” Lawrence school board member Craig Grant said. Grant had worked to defeat the conservatives who attracted international attention and...

There is a concerted effort underway in Kansas to censor science and undermine the strong science standards adopted there last year. In 2005 the Kansas state board of education (KSBOE) courageously voted to adopt science standards that require students to learn all about evolution, including both the scientific evidence and for and against the theory. That's it. The Board didn't require any alternative theories be taught, just the evidence for and against Darwinian evolution. However there are a number of groups both inside and outside of Kansas that are seeking to stifle discussion in Kansas classrooms of anything critical of...

Reason to Believe A leading geneticist argues that science can lead to faith. Reviewed by Scott Russell Sanders THE LANGUAGE OF GOD A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief By Francis S. Collins Here we are, briefly, under the sun, one species among millions on a gorgeous planet in the remote provinces of the universe, our very existence a riddle. Of all the words we use to mask our ignorance, none has been more abused, none has given rise to more strife, none has rolled from the tongues of more charlatans than the name of God. Nor has any word been...

In the 1993 movie Jurassic Park, one human character tells another that a Tyrannosaurus rex can't see them if they don't move, even though the beast is right in front of them. Now, a scientist reports that T. rex had some of the best vision in animal history. This sensory prowess strengthens arguments for T. rex's role as predator instead of scavenger. Scientists had some evidence from measurements of T. rex skulls that the animal could see well. Recently, Kent A. Stevens of the University of Oregon in Eugene went further. He used facial models of seven types of dinosaurs...

Recently, the state of South Carolina joined Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Kansas and New Mexico by approving statewide science standards which require a critical analysis of evolution in science classrooms. In these five states the standard-issue Darwinian evolution will still be taught, but with an interesting twist which ought to raise some eyebrows - the scientific WEAKNESSES of Darwinian theory will ALSO be disclosed. In a country where ideals such as free speech, diversity, balance and tolerance are preached constantly, the remaining states DO NOT ALLOW the scientific weaknesses of Darwinian evolution to be presented in our public school science classrooms. This...

I have been speaking to diverse small groups about science and religion in the context of the ongoing national debate about the teaching of evolution in our public schools. The response to my talks has been almost uniformly positive. It would be useful for other physicists to do as I have been doing. My audiences have been service clubs such as Rotary, high-school and college students of science and science journalism, a school-based community event, a League of Women Voters chapter, a Unitarian church, and a microscopy club. They have ranged from a dozen to some 60 or 70 people....

When the New York State Assembly's legislative session ended on June 23, 2006, Assembly Bill 8036 died in committee. If enacted, the bill would have required that "all pupils in grades kindergarten through twelve in all public schools in the state ... receive instruction in all aspects of the controversy surrounding evolution and the origins of man." A later provision specified that such instruction would include information about "intelligent design and information effectively challenging the theory of evolution." The bill was never expected to succeed; its sponsor, Assemblyman Daniel L. Hooker (R-District 127), was reported as explaining that his intention...

In a veiled attack on creationism, the world's foremost academies of science on Wednesday called on parents and teachers to provide children with the facts about evolution and the origins of life on Earth. A declaration signed by 67 national academies of science blasted the scriptural teaching of biology as a potential distortion of young minds. "In various parts of the world, within science courses taught in certain public systems of education, scientific evidence, data and testable theories about the origins and evolution of life on Earth are being concealed, denied or confused with theories not testable by science," the...

Somewhere on Earth, close to 4 billion years ago, a set of molecular reactions flipped a switch and became life. Scientists try to imagine this animating event by simplifying the processes that characterize living things. ...... Shapiro, however, thinks this so-called "RNA world" is still too complex to be the origin of life. Information-carrying molecules like RNA are sequences of molecular "bits." The primordial soup would be full of things that would terminate these sequences before they grew long enough to be useful, Shapiro says. ........ The researchers propose in this month's issue of Molecular Biology and Evolution that this...

Nature of Peer Review Undergoing Review at Nature    06/13/2006   The science cops are on trial.  Peer review, the process that many are led to believe enforces objectivity and validity in scientific papers, has come under fire lately (see 03/17/2006, 02/05/2006, 01/31/2006, 01/09/2006).  In response to scandals and criticisms that the peer review as practiced is no guarantee against fraud, Nature is stepping out into uncharted waters.     In an Editorial entitled “Peer review on trial,”1 Nature announced two initiatives that seem revolutionary if they become the new standard.  One is to attach blogs to every item posted...

Some scientists call for a bigger dose of evolution in doctors' educations Joon Yun, MD, began considering how evolution applies to human health a decade ago, when his first heart disease patients died. These cases disturbed Yun, then a Stanford radiology resident. But they also intrigued him. Having studied evolutionary biology in college, Yun tried fitting these medical failures into that framework. His mind wandered to the early days of humans when heart disease was a rare trigger of death. In the prehistoric era, a more likely cause of death would have been an attack by a predator. The human...

A leading British scientist said yesterday that he had given up trying to persuade creationists that Darwin's theory is correct after repeatedly being misrepresented and, he said, branded a liar. Speaking at the Guardian Hay festival at Hay-on-Wye, the evolutionary biologist Steve Jones spoke of his frustrations when trying to debate with religious opponents. "I don't engage with creationists directly," he said, saying that, when he had, they had frequently quoted him out of context or accused him of lying. "If somebody has decided to believe something - whatever the evidence - then there is nothing you can do about...